Matter & Energy

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WITH A SNAP The leaves of the Venus flytrap capture prey through a process called snap-buckling. The outer leaf surface expands until it’s too much for the inner surface of the leaf to bear.

ATILA/SHUTTERSTOCK

LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT To make a new measurement of the neutron’s lifetime, physicists confined neutrons within a chamber and counted the number that remained using an apparatus (shown) located at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico.

Courtesy Los Alamos National Lab

IN MOTION The Gaia spacecraft can reveal new features of the universe, thanks to its ability to track the movement of stars, like the rotation of the Large Magellanic Cloud, shown in this image based on light measured by Gaia.